Date: 7/7/25 6:29 am From: Joseph Neal <0000078cbd583d7c-dmarc-request...> Subject: TALLGRASS PRAIRIE FLOWERS AND BIRDS AT CAMP ROBINSON
It was for certain blazing hot/humid yesterday (96F at 5 PM), but that’s just what the native flora of our Tallgrass Prairies wants. And birds seemed to do OK, too, based upon our almost 4-hours yesterday afternoon on Camp Robinson Special Use Area tour. eBird list here: https://ebird.org/checklist/S257786313.
There are some truly dramatic flowers in bloom along the tour road. Several that caught my eye: tall purple Blazing Stars (or Gayfeathers as they used to be called, before “gay” became a hot button issue of our unfortunate culture wars) and stunning Rudbeckia grandiflora, a spectacular coneflower. In a few fields there were patches of both.
Hard to take it all in. Plus: lovely pink patches of Sabatias, Blue Hearts, and lots and lots of purple Ironweeds.
Our botanists yesterday stayed very busy with all of this, plus helping me identify what I can no longer effectively hear. I truly love all of this. It reminds me of how I used to feel going to a carnival when I was a kid. So much novelty and excitement. So many colors. So many wonderful surprises.
You could do all this with the windows up and AC blowing, but then you’d miss all the bird vocalizations. Even in a blazing hot July, lots of bird vocalizations still to be heard. We never did decide if we actually heard Northern Bobwhites or just a trick from the many Yellow-breasted Chats. You might also miss quite a few of the dragonflies – lots and lots yesterday. You can also do it the way we did a few times: put down the windows and let the AC blow.
One very interesting bird was Orchard Oriole. We saw one perched up, then a second, then next to Number 2, one of those second year males with a black throat. I assume this is the nesting male and if so, that answers a question for me – do these black-throated Orchards nest? Well yes, seems so.
